from the urls-we-dig-up dept

Nuclear energy usually has a significant NIMBY problem (Not In My Back Yard!) that prevents nuclear power plants from being constructed. There's no simple solution to this obstacle, and even when the reactor is going to be thousands (or millions) of miles away from any people in a spacecraft, the danger of launching a nuclear reactor on a rocket is still too risky for some folks. There haven't been any nuclear disasters in space, but as more and more nuclear powered spacecraft are built, the anti-nuclear groups may grow increasingly loud. Here are just a few nuclear spacecraft projects that could travel beyond our planet.

from the urls-we-dig-up dept

Someday, the world will run out of fossil fuels to burn. But maybe we can avoid running out of fossil fuels by figuring out another energy source, so we won't need to burn hydrocarbons to produce electricity. Nuclear fission is just one possible energy source that could potentially replace coal, oil and natural gas entirely -- but there are some obvious drawbacks such as long-term radioactivity from its waste and the possibility of creating more nuclear weapons. Nuclear technology keeps moving forward (whether or not we've figured out how to deal with WMDs), and here are just a few examples.